—thirty-four, good God, he would be thirty-four tomorrow—

  —thirty-three, he didn’t feel it at all. A vision confronted him then, of himself on a porch, which was ridiculous since they lived in an apartment together, of the way their hands would look in fifty years, of the way Somers would look in fifty years, wondering if splotched and papery skin still carried the same spark, wondering if desire lived after fifty, wondering if Somers would love him that long, if Somers could love him that long, if Hazard wouldn’t simply do something that would finally snap Somers’s patience. That was all, just that vision of the two of them on the porch, and maybe they were holding hands and maybe they weren’t, and Evie might be there, and if they had a little boy, he wouldn’t be so little anymore, he would be—

  Hazard snipped the thought, drawing his attention back to the moment. But the thought didn’t go quite so easily. It didn’t go at all, really. It was still there. If they had a little boy.

  “These men,” Naomi was saying, “want to talk to you about Brother Jesse.”

  “He’s really much more charming than he looks,” Sirkaa said. “Have you met him?”

  Somers had the decency not to look at Hazard, but a smirk tugged at the corners of his mouth. “We’ve met. He didn’t like us much.”

  “I don’t think he likes anyone much.”

  “Sister Hastback,” Naomi said. “That’s not true. Brother Jesse is full of the love of God for all creatures, great and small. He loves you, and he loves—”

  “None of that. I like you, Naomi, I do. You’re a sweet girl.”

  Girl, Hazard thought, fighting to keep his face smooth. Seventy years old, almost eighty, but Sirkaa Hastback called her a girl.

  “But what I like about is you that you don’t always have to roll everything in sugar before you give it to me.”

  A pained expression crossed Naomi’s face, and she glanced at Hazard and Somers.

  “I know, I know,” Sirkaa said. “They’re here. You’re putting on a good show for them. I understand. But I don’t want a show. I like you. The real you. And that’s what I want.”

  Sister Naomi opened her mouth, shut it again, and flushed.

  “Another decade or so,” Sirkaa said to Hazard, “and she’ll have a good head on her shoulders.”

  “I’ve got a long ways to go, then,” Hazard said.

  “Yes. You do. But I’ve heard about you, and you’re not as bad as most. Anyway, you’re pretty enough that you can get away with being stupid for a little longer.”

  Somers’s jaw almost cracked against the floor.

  “You wanted to ask me about Brother Jesse. All right. Here’s what I’ll tell you: I don’t think he likes much of anything. No, no, Naomi. Let me say my piece. He puts up with me, although he thinks I’m a terribly wicked sinner. He smiles at me as best he can, although most of the time he looks like he’s chewing nails, and God only knows if he’s ever seen what a smile is supposed to look like. He puts up with me because I listen and because I let him invite other people to my home and because I’ve given a fair bit of pocket change to Brother Jeshua’s congregation.”

  Pocket change, Hazard thought, thinking of the mossy woodwork and the tiny figurines and wondering what pocket change meant for a woman like Sirkaa Hastback.

  “But he doesn’t like me, and truth be told, I don’t know that he likes anyone. Do you know what would improve Brother Jesse?”

  Somers shook his head. Sirkaa ignored him, her attention riveted on Hazard until he said, “A gallon of bleach.”

  Sirkaa cackled, and a smile cracked Naomi’s facade before vanishing again. “Bleach, yes, I like that. I was going to say a bath, a scrub, and a bottle of shampoo. That hair! God only knows when he washed it.”

  “God wouldn’t take the time to check,” Hazard said.

  “No,” Sirkaa said, her mouth flattening, her expression suddenly grave. “No, I don’t think you believe that. You don’t believe that God would love one of His children more than another, do you?”

  “I don’t believe in God.”

  Sirkaa’s eyes narrowed. One of her hands levitated, as though pulled to her thinning cloud of hair by a static charge. Her fingers brushed through the white wisps, rasping against the scalp, and the sound was almost serpentine, like scales rubbing. “But you do believe.”

  “No,” Naomi said. “He doesn’t.”

  “He does,” Sirkaa said. “He just doesn’t know it yet.”

  “I’m right here, you know,” Hazard said.

  “Yes.” Sirkaa’s eyes drifted up and down. “I’m rather enjoying that fact.”

  Hazard fought the blush and lost.

  “Miss Hastback,” Somers said, and then he paused, biting his lip, the bastard, his cheeks red with suppressed laughter. “Miss Hastback, we’d like to know about Brother Jesse’s visit on Saturday.”

  “Yes? What about it?”

  “When was he here?”

  “All day.”

  “Can you be more specific?”

  “I suppose I could check my calendar.” With some effort, she raised herself from the faux velvet settee and moved into the kitchen, visible through an arched doorway. Her steps were slower, now, Hazard noticed, and the stiffness of age showed in her movement. She was old, of course. Older even than Naomi. But until she had slowed down for a minute, her energy and enthusiasm had masked it. When she came back, she propped a calendar against one arm and said, “He was supposed to come at nine, and he stayed until five.”

  “He was supposed to come at nine?” Somers said. “What happened?”

  “There was traffic,” Naomi said.

  “Traffic in Dore County?”

  “An accident on the highway. They closed it for a half an hour.”

  Somers raised an eyebrow at Hazard; they would have to check into that. “And he stayed the whole day?”

  “Oh, yes,” Sirkaa said. “Mrs. DeWitte came for a while—she’s always giving him the eye, you know, and it’s really no surprise since Clarence DeWitte probably took a shower once every twenty years and I suppose Mrs. DeWitte is entitled to have what young people call a ‘type,’ isn’t she?—and then Mrs. Farber, and the two Miss Abramsons, and—”

  “All these people visited Jesse?”

  “There were more of course. He’s quite the speaker, Detective. Not so much the things he says—too much about harlots and fine-twined linens, you understand, and not enough of the good things, the simple things, the sheep, you know? One really can’t say enough about the sheep, wouldn’t you agree?”

  She was looking at Hazard, and this time he refused to answer her. He knew what she meant. He didn’t care. He suddenly felt an intense aversion to Sirkaa Hastback—not dislike, but a need to be away from her. It was as though she had seen him naked. Worse, somehow. And he couldn’t put a finger on it, couldn’t name what it was that she had done that had made him so uncomfortable.

  “Yes,” Somers said. “And did those visits last all day?”

  “Oh no. They mostly come in the morning. I serve tea, you know. And a few cookies because the Miss Abramsons aren’t happy if I don’t put out lemon crisps.”

  “And in the afternoon?”

  “The afternoon was quiet, Detective. Brother Jesse and I entertained each other.” A trace of a smile lightened the furrows around her mouth. “Not in the way you might be thinking.”

  Somers, laughing, said, “At this point, I don’t know what to think.”

  “You don’t like Brother Jesse,” Hazard said, and he didn’t like the sound of his voice, didn’t like how hard it came out.

  “No. No, I don’t. Not tremendously. But I am very old. And this house is very big. Not when you first look at it, I suppose. But it gets bigger. The longer I’m here, the bigger it seems. And I just get smaller every year.”

  Like a cave, Hazard thought, remembering the sense of space and echoes. Like a shell. That vast, black emptiness, where every movement came back a thousandfold.

  “Do you plan on joining Brother Walden’s congregation?” Somers asked.

  “I’ll have to think about that. I’m an old woman. I don’t make decisions quickly; Sister Naomi understands.”

  Sister Naomi nodded, but it was clear from her face that she wanted to say something like shit or get off the pot. “Sister Sirkaa is very close to receiving the word,” Naomi said. “Very close. I know that I have seen Brother Jeshua’s light fill her like a sacred vessel. Soon, very soon, I know that her heart will be purified.”

  Sirkaa nodded along with the words, but when she spoke, she sounded sad and tired. “I’ve told you before, Naomi. It’s a very nice message. And I very much enjoy the visits. But I’m not sure.”

  “I’d like to share something with you. The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, and I am compelled to witness to you. Will you accept my witness?”

  Sighing, Sirkaa nodded.

  “Let me get my Bible from the car.” Naomi scuttled to the door, surprisingly fast for her age.

  Again, Sirkaa sighed. “They love to talk but not to listen. Sometimes I feel sixteen again, kissing a boy I know I won’t ever take home.”

  “It’s different, isn’t it?” Somers said, his eyes on Hazard, eyes like oceans in a dream, a dream of white sand and then tropical water to the horizon. “It’s different when you know you can take them home.”

  “Yes,” Sirkaa said simply.

  “A few more questions,” Somers said, his voice husky for some reason Hazard didn’t understand. “During the afternoon, did you take a nap? Or perhaps you spent some time washing up in the kitchen? Or you were reading in another room?”

  “You want to know if I left Brother Jesse alone.”

  “That would be helpful.”

  Sirkaa cackled, and her hand rasped against her scalp again, the wispy hair trembling under her touch. “A few minutes here. A few minutes there. I don’t know.”

  “Long enough that he might have left and come back without you noticing?”

  “No. Don’t be silly.”

  “And you’re sure that he left at five?”

  “Of course. I’m old, Detective, not senile.”

  They ended the interview, and Sirkaa Hastback rocked herself to her feet, and her breath sounded like bat wings, velvety soft and scraping limestone, as she led their procession to the door.

  “Sister Naomi will probably want to say her piece,” Somers said with a wry smile.

  Sirkaa waved away the words. “I’ve read about you two. In the paper. And I’ve heard more. I’ve heard the things nobody will print.”

  Thunderheads smashed together in Hazard’s chest. “And what the fuck business is it of yours?”

  “Only that I’m very happy for you.” And then she caught the screen door with her hip and let in air that smelled like rain and crocus stems and mud. Eyeing the sky, she added, “Good Lord, what time is it?”

  “Almost noon,” Somers said.

  “Noon? I’ll be late for my hair—sweet chees’ums, that’s the second time this week. You two have to scat, now.”

  Hazard followed his partner out onto the mossy porch and stopped. He was struck by the scene before him, and his mind processed it first as a tableau vivant, one of those upper-crust pastimes that had flourished maybe a century ago, where rich people stood around and imitated famous paintings. He’d read about it, of course. It popped up here and there, historically. Like so many other details, it was neatly catalogued on an index card and filed at the back of Hazard’s mind. This scene, the one in front of him, would have been called Abandonment or Betrayal or Sacrilege. None of those were right, though, and then the correct name tumbled into place. Pieta. That’s what this would be. Fucking pieta.

  Naomi lay on her side, propping herself with one arm, her face dusty and blood curving like a fish hook from the corner of her mouth down under her jaw. The pose was ludicrous, unintentionally so; it was the pose of girls on sandy beaches, Sports Illustrated girls half-rising, their best assets turned towards the camera. But Naomi didn’t look like a covergirl. She looked shocked and frightened and small. She was starting to cry, and the tears muddied the side of her face.

  A few yards down the drive, Brother Jesse was dragging Clyde towards a Jeep. Clyde didn’t struggle. He plodded along, his head down, his shoulders slumped, his chicken chest puffing and puffing. He was bloody too. Worse than Naomi, that much was clear even from a distance. Jesse had really laid into him. Jesse had really dished it out. And Hazard knew, right then, how it would feel to give Jesse some of the same. He could hit him hard, really hard, a kidney punch, and he could watch the pain travel up Jesse’s face, watch it fizz like a sparkler on a dark night, and that would be goddamn perfect. That would be just the beginning of what Hazard would do to the bastard.

  Jesse shoved Clyde into the Jeep, jumped behind the wheel, and backed down the driveway. His tires skidded as he braked, turned, and shot onto the road. Hazard took two steps and then paused.

  Long gashes marred the Interceptor’s tires where Jesse had slashed them.

  SIRKAA HASTBACK WAS GENEROUS ENOUGH to call off her hair appointment. She tottered back inside, and Hazard took the stairs down to Sister Naomi, who was still trying to lift herself out of the patch of dirt and weeds where she had fallen.

  “I’m all right,” Sister Naomi said, holding out a hand. “I’m perfectly all right.”

  And then she burst into tears.

  It was the crying that did Hazard in. He could handle religious zealots. He could handle insane, irrational beliefs. He could handle the digs and jabs, the homophobia, the hatred. But this sobbing wreck, like someone was trying to shake a paper doll to pieces, this wasn’t in his wheelhouse. He squatted, took her in his arms, and carried her into the house.

  Somers watched. He was biting his lip. His eyes were the color of spring, mornings, of after-storms.

  “Don’t say a fucking word.”

  “Never.”

  Inside, Hazard laid Naomi on the faux velvet settee, and he found a wool throw, and when he tugged it loose it caught a ceramic lamb, and the lamb flipped onto its side and spun, legs churning the air, like someone had cut its throat. Hazard ignored it. He spread the throw over the sobbing woman.

  “Sister Naomi,” Somers said. “Are you all right?”

  “Of course she’s not all right. Go see what you can do about a car.”

  Somers’s eyebrows went up.

  “I told you: not one fucking word.”

  One side of the blond man’s mouth twitched, but he nodded, and as he headed towards the front door he drew out his phone.

  “You’re fine,” Hazard said. “Stop crying.”

  With a long snivel, Naomi drew one hand under her nose, and it came away gleaming with snot. “Go away.”

  “After I carried your old ass inside? Not a chance.”

  “Go away. You’re horrible. I hate you. And I didn’t need you to carry me inside. And I don’t care what Sirkaa says, you’re not very pretty at all.”

  The last part she delivered in a shout, and in spite of himself, Hazard felt a smile crack his face. And then he was laughing, and a moment later, Naomi blushed and ran her hands over her eyes. She didn’t laugh, but the red in her cheeks turned to purple, and she looked like she might try to climb under the throw.

  “Sirkaa was right about you,” Hazard said. “You’re a hell of a lot easier to be around when you actually say what you’re thinking.”

  “I always say what I’m thinking.”

  “No. You don’t.”

  Then Sirkaa bustled in, carrying a tray with bandages and a pair of stainless steel scissors that looked like they’d come off a World War II battlefield and tea and the lemon crisps that the two Miss Abramsons loved. Hazard snatched one of the cookies as Sirkaa passed. It was good. Powdery, lemony, the perfect crunch. Maybe the two Miss Abramsons were on to something.

  In spite of Sirkaa’s best attempts at coddling and swaddling and nursing and bandaging, there wasn’t really much to be done. Naomi’s lower lip was swelling, and the corner of her mouth had split, but the bleeding had stopped. As far as anyone could tell, there weren’t any broken bones.

  “My sister-in-law died like that,” Sirkaa said cheerfully, her leathery face shining in the electric light. “Internal bleeding. A broken rib. It popped her like a water balloon.”

  Naomi paled. “I don’t think—”

  “Of course, you’ll be fine, dear. Just fine. Now let me—oh. The tea’s gone cold. Give me just a jiff.”

  And then she was gone.

  “Well?” Hazard said.

  Drawing the throw up to her chin, Naomi made what looked like an incredible effort and met Hazard’s eyes. “I don’t hate you.”

  “What happened out there?”

  “I need you to know that. I was in pain. The weakness of the flesh, I spoke in anger, and I didn’t mean it.”

  “I’d rather you did. Being hated honestly is a hell of a lot easier to bear than being loved by a hypocrite.”

  “What is wrong with you?” Naomi lurched upright, still clutching the throw to her chest. “I offer you nothing but kindness. I offer you the Word of God, His love for the children of men, and you throw it back in my face. I know you don’t believe. You’ve made that perfectly clear. But can’t you at least show respect for my beliefs?”

  “Your beliefs?” That was all Hazard managed to say. And then he was back there again, back at Elah, the Valley of Elah Conversion Center. He was in the room. The sanctuary, they called it, and maybe that was someone’s idea of a joke. Not big enough to stand up in. Not big enough to lie down in. He could kneel and bend his head in the sanctuary, and his shoulders still brushed the plaster above him. He would take slow breaths. He would count them, the way he was counting them now. The walls were white, everything was white, even the sunlight coming in through the cramped window was white, and there was some trick to that, some trick to the light, because when the sun reached the right angle, the whole sanctuary seemed to catch fire. All he could do was kneel and breathe. And his neck, his shoulders, his back, his knees, they were red and pulsing, like digital pushpins in a map of pain. And still the light. Pouring through the window. Turning everything incandescent. He could smell that light, and it smelled like molten glass. Deep breaths. Long breaths. One. He would go home. Two. He would go home. Three. One day, one day he would go home.